Hcs 335 - Ethics Theory and Contemporary Issues

Ethical Decision

Morgan Perez

HCS/335

August 20, 2018

Christine Singel

Ethical Decision

So many times in our day to day professional life we are faced with questionable situations that push you to apply ethical theory to your decision making.  The Health Care industry is saturated with instances that require one to use problem solving and ethical theory to navigate their way through their career.

         Previously, I was employed as a Compliance Manager for a local Medicaid Health Plan.  One facet of my job duties was to ensure that our company policies were being followed.  My fellow employees were told that they could either come to me directly, or submit concerns regarding a policy breach through an anonymous email source, which was also screened by me.   Over a time period of one to two months, I started to receive several notifications both in person and through email that the Office Manager was in breach of our employee confidentiality policy.   I was advised by several employees that the Office Manager was discussing coworkers, and executive’s salary information, performance review results and various other topics that breached the company’s confidentiality policies.  The information that was provided to me left me feeling not only very disturbed but also disappointed that someone that was in a position of influence an authority would do something that could potentially impact the moral of the entire company.

         After gathering facts and from the employees, it was clear that I was faced with making a difficult ethical decision.  I first started to apply various problem solving methodologies.  I clarified the problem, by following up with the employees to gather concrete evidence to support my course of action. I then spoke directly to the office manager to find the root cause of the issue. It seemed that she was disgruntled that other staff was being compensated at a higher level.   Based on the information I received from the staff and the office manager, I selected my solution.   I knew that I had to go to the Executive Management team and report the incident.